The maintenance room smelled of rancid grease and electrical dust. Elias slid the metal door shut and slammed the bolt home. Jacques collapsed against a locker, his breath nothing more than a wet wheeze. In this cramped room, away from the pulsing organic walls of the tunnel, the silence felt almost artificial.
Elias didn't look at Jacques. His eyes were locked on the interface burning into his retinas.
[ESSENCE BALANCE: 2,500]
[EVALUATION: PRECARIOUS SURVIVAL. UPGRADE REQUIRED.]
"Why don't you rest?" Jacques asked between coughing fits. "We have an hour before the Purge..."
"Rest is a luxury we can't afford, Jacques," Elias replied without looking back.
He opened the Ascension Shop tab. A cascade of icons scrolled by: Jötunn bone blades, thermal sensors, neurological stimulants. The prices were astronomical. For 2,500 points—the fruit of a life-and-death struggle gutted by the solidarity tax—he only had access to the "scrap" of the system.
He bypassed the combat options. Too expensive. He needed something that would let him go the distance. Then, he found a foul-looking item, a grayish pulse in the interface:
[ITEM: HEART OF THE DRAUGR (COMMON)]
[COST: 2,000 ESSENCE]
[DESCRIPTION: AN ORGANIC GRAFT SOURCED FROM THE UNDEAD OF THE LOWER REALMS. PARTIALLY REPLACES METABOLIC FUNCTIONS.]
[EFFECTS: REDUCED HUNGER AND THIRST (80%). DECREASED NEED FOR SLEEP. INCREASED RESISTANCE TO PHYSICAL FATIGUE.]
[NOTE: THE SUBJECT WILL LOSE THE SENSE OF TASTE AND A PORTION OF BODY HEAT.]
Less hunger. Less fatigue. Elias stared at the item. It was a bottom-tier upgrade, the kind given to disposable foot soldiers, but in a world where supermarkets were now battlegrounds, not needing to eat was a grim necessity.
"What are you buying?" Jacques asked, intrigued by the blue glow in Elias's eyes.
"A more efficient engine," Elias said in a hollow voice.
He clicked [CONFIRM INSTALLATION].
The agony was instantaneous.
Elias was slammed against the wall. This wasn't a magical transaction; it was a non-anesthetic surgical procedure directed by the System. He felt his ribs forcibly pry apart. Inside his chest, his real heart raced in a panic before being constricted by cold, dead fibers. The "Draugr Heart" rooted itself into his arteries, pumping blood that was thicker, slower, and colder.
He wretched black fluid onto the floor, his lungs burning as if he had swallowed liquid nitrogen.
[INSTALLATION SUCCESSFUL]
[STATUS: NOVICE HYBRID]
[REMAINING BALANCE: 500 ESSENCE]
After a few minutes, Elias stood up. The pain had evaporated, leaving behind an eerie stillness. He no longer felt his pulse in his throat. He no longer felt the gnawing emptiness in his stomach. He felt... hollow. But it was a powerful, inexhaustible hollowness.
He looked at Jacques. The old man was shivering from the cold. Elias, however, could no longer feel the chill of the room. His skin had turned a faint, sallow lividity, his veins tinting toward gray.
"Elias... your eyes..." Jacques whispered, recoiling.
"They see well enough, Jacques."
Elias picked up his extinguisher. He didn't feel "stronger" in the sense of a superhero—he felt like a machine that had been stripped of its unnecessary parts. He had traded the joy of a meal or the comfort of a bed for 14 days of relentless walking toward the Core. It was a miserable trade, but it was the only one he could afford.
"We move," Elias said. "The Purge is coming. And now, I can run until my muscles tear from my bones without stopping."
He opened the door. The Hunt had just crossed a threshold: Elias was no longer entirely prey, but he was still a long way from being a predator.
[TIME REMAINING: 13 DAYS, 22 HOURS, 55 MINUTES]